Visitors to Heathcote Museum and Gallery this month should put aside nostalgic memories of ‘comic books’ such as Beano or Dandy that they may have enjoyed in their childhood. This new breed of the Graphic Novel is as far from Dennis the Menace as one could imagine.

My intention in visiting this exhibition was twofold, I have long been a fan of the graphic novel genre and I was keen to see the standard of work being produced by local artists. I was not disappointed as I believe our local illustrators are definitely up to the task of carrying the torch for W.A.in the global market. Being an artist of a different discipline, I was also interested to see whether graphic novel art holds any similarities to contemporary ‘fine’ art (for want of a better term) in relation to social commentary. Is there validity within this relatively new emergence of the graphic narrative, for today’s audience?

What I found on the walls of Heathcote Gallery was a collection of very different individual styles of work, with one obvious similarity. Each artist approaches their art ‘fully loaded’ with cultural influences and an inherent awareness of the expectations of their audience. The art of the graphic novel is not high brow or pretentious, as other disciplines tend to be; it has a visual language which is easily recognisable to anyone living in contemporary times. This genre doesn’t hide it’s ‘warts and all’ social standing, it embraces it. Visitors expecting superhero stories be warned, this new ilk of artists are more likely to regale you with darkly ironic tales of real social evils and childhood fears than rippling biceps and good guy attitudes.

The title of the exhibition is quite appropriate, for though there are disparate narratives running through the works there is a level of elegant coherence also.  Images of Justin Randall’s traditional 'pulp fiction' zombies somehow sit in harmony with the eclectic and charming Water Buffalo of Shaun Tan; Anton McKay’s confident Hergé style (Tintin) drawings juxtapose smoothly against Mel Tregonning’s subtle Night series.  The technical expertise of these artists and the maturity of their differing methods balance beautifully, relating and informing each others work well.

My personal favourites, I found in the last room of the gallery. Chris Bolton’s illustration for Waldo’s Hawaiian Holiday depicts a couple of Antlike alien beings dressed as professors, bespectacled and sporting pocket protectors. The illustration glows eerily as if submerged in green honey. I guess I’ll have to buy the graphic novel to work out their relevance to the story.

Mark Welsh stands out for me as the pick of the crop, with his pieces from The Mechanic. Strangely reminiscent of movies like Blade Runner and tipping its hat at Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, these artworks bring to mind the internal dialogues and conversations we silently carry on in daily life. Against the finely rendered image of a hover-car overlayed with the palimpsest of other illustrations, the handwritten text narrates “They told him VB stood for Vitamin B, he didn’t believe them, he wasn’t that gullible. He did buy Body Building shampoo, it tightened his abdominals and halted his walking hairline. He wanted to be a human advertisement.”

It is this almost Alice in Wonderland dreamlike quality to good graphic novel art that keeps bringing me back. The pleasure I find in this genre is in the immediacy of communication and the contemporary nature of its visual and textual narratives. Not to mention the sumptuous control of colour and form.

One of the few criticisms I can make of this exhibition is the tendency of illustrators to showcase their work on foam core boards or just in poster form. This has the unfortunate affect of making the exhibition look amateurish, belying the professionalism of the artists involved. I believe the strength of this collection would’ve benefitted from a more sensitive approach to its curating.